Promotional United Artists stickers and badges

Often the most exciting times are an introduction to people who used to work for record labels as they can be rich sources for interesting items, especially if they worked in the promo department or as reps selling the records, in person, into the shops as they tended to be well stocked with interesting promotional items to solicit orders from the shops or encourage point-of-purchase sales.

In this instance it was indeed a sales rep, someone who worked for one of the better labels, United Artists. Once we got past the tosh such as Brass Construction and Crystal Gale there were some lovely pieces of punk rock memorabilia that had been in the loft since the late 1970s.

The stickers were all small, designed to be onto display units, shop counters etc. and included Buzzcocks ‘Another Music In A Different Kitchen’, Stranglers ‘No More Heroes’ album and the classic 999 logo.

There were some fantastic promotional badges as well, my favourites were Stranglers ‘Get A Grip in ’77’ and ‘I’ve Learnt Peaches’, others included various ‘Black & White’ and ‘No More Heroes’ album promo badges, 999, Buzzcocks ‘Love Bites’, surprisingly one for the first Fischer-Z single ‘Wax Dolls’ and even Pat Collier’s post-Vibrators power-pop project The Boyfriends.

This is a rare opportunity to acquire some unusual and scarce items, all of which will be on the next newsletter. Subscribers get early access to new releases before they hit the site for everyone else, so if you fancy snapping up a real gem, you should subscribe immediately, if not sooner.